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Publication
Abstract
The Bureaucracy and Governance in 16 Developing Countries,
World Governance Survey Discussion Paper 7
The bureaucratic arena refers to all state organizations
engaged in implementing policy as well as in regulating and
delivering services. Governance issues in the bureaucratic
arena take on special significance given the massive pressures
that have been placed on public agencies in recent years to
become leaner, more efficient and bring services closer to
the people. As part of a project to undertake comprehensive
governance assessments, we focus here on the nature of the
rules (formal and informal) that affect the bureaucracy. While
issues of bureaucratic governance are not constitutive of
development per se, they are seen as crucial determinants
of the degree to which a country makes social and economic
progress - or fails to do so. The rules that determine procedures
in the bureaucracy, whether formal or informal, are especially
important for public perceptions of how the state operates.
This paper presents our findings on the bureaucracy arena
in 16 developing countries. Four observations stand out as
especially important. The first is that bureaucracy is one
of the more problematic arenas of governance in the countries
in our study. Hiring is rarely on merit, bureaucrats are seldom
seen to be accountable, and the operations of the civil service
often lack real transparency. The second point is that the
relationship between rules and structures, on the one hand,
and performance, on the other, is difficult to establish.
It is not that the link is unimportant. It is, but even disaggregated,
it is hard to know what rules have what kind of effect. In
our study, transparency and accountability proved to be the
indicators where there is some evidence of a correlation with
performance.
Our third observation is that reforming the bureaucratic
arena is really difficult. One of our country coordinators
summarized it well when he said, "This arena has proved
hardest to reform in the years of transition and the average
scores are just another evidence of these difficulties."
It is clear that reforms take time to implement and even longer
to have an impact on development outcomes. The fourth observation
we want to make is that reforming the bureaucracy requires
sensitivity to regime-specific issues. Context matters, but
it is encouraging that level of development, according to
our study, is not a critical issue. It is possible for poor
countries to improve bureaucratic governance. Tanzania and
Thailand are two very different countries where reforms have
been undertaken and progress has been registered.
These are obviously interesting and important finding for
all those who are in the business of improving public administration
or public sector performance. Our study suggests that these
are issues that should be given primary attention. This study
also provides encouragement for organizations like Transparency
International that is in the forefront of combating corruption
by working practically on issues such as accountability and
transparency. However, our study also suggests that more work
is needed in order to throw more light on the issues where
there is a deviation from the 'ideal model' advocated by agencies
in the international development community. Above all, it
must be recognized that reform is not merely a 'technical'
issue. The bureaucratic arena cannot be treated in isolation
from other governance arenas, although public sector reform
efforts have tended to do so. Our findings indicate that a
pure public administration perspective may be too narrow and
technical in many cases and fail to focus on the real problem.
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